We checked into our rooms; I was glad to see that Ewan and I were
sharing one. After we had unpacked our things he took me in his arms.
The ferocity of the day and his return to my life had left me feeling
confused, exhausted and excited.

“Let’s not stay downstairs all night,” I said. “Can’t we...”

“Follow my lead,” he said. “But we must make a showing. And I’d
like to see the report.”

“I suppose so.”

We made quite a large table, with all six of Fred’s group there,
but it was a quiet and rather tired gathering. I wanted to be talking
to Ewan and the effort of making conversation to the others was almost
too much for me.

Once we’d finished we moved to the bar, where there was a TV. I
scarcely paid it any attention as we were taking our seats, until Neal
suddenly shouted.

“Look!”

It was a pop concert in a huge hall somewhere, and a young woman
was singing, seated at a keyboard, with a group behind her. She was
Patty McCann, a singer I remembered from before The Problems. And
what she was singing was Joining the Future; it was a slow,
anthemic number, and behind her you could see the audience swaying,
holding lighters in the air.

“Oh my God,” I said, and sank into a chair.

Neal was laughing and pointing at me.

“Did you set this up, Susan?” I said.

“No. I wish we had, but we didn’t. It’s just taken off.”

“It won’t last,” I said. “It’s just a craze. The kids will soon
get cynical about it.”

“Some will, and some won’t,” said Ewan. “It’s perfectly normal.
There are ways to handle that stuff and we can talk about it later.”

“Good song, though,” said Max, as the concert faded and the news
started.

But it was simply the usual mix of home and foreign stories, with
no mention of us at all. Then the newsreader finished by suggesting
we should stay tuned for a special report from Birmingham, and I knew
we were in for the heavy treatment.

“Oh no,” I said. “Is this going to be good or bad?”

The report started with a sequence of depressing shots from round
Birmingham with downbeat music. Then we were in the studio, with a
man I remembered seeing in the TV crew at the school.

The streets of Birmingham. My name is Andrew Mason, and this
is my city, my home city, where I’ve lived all my life, and which I
still love with the despairing love of someone who sees their beloved
sink into alcoholism or madness. Where all of us have had to endure
some of the worst fighting, some the worst atrocities, some of the
worst devastation in the country. Where still we have scarcely begun
to sort out the mess, or start on the long road to reconstruction.

And this is Madigan High School, one of our large inner city
schools. Two thousand students, from all our various groups, because
in Birmingham, once you look closely, everyone is a minority. That’s
one of the reasons why it was so hard for us here. The stories those
two thousand students have to tell would break your hearts if you
heard them all. And to this school today came the Standard Clothing
and the Golden Circle, and one thousand of those students became
controlled children. I went there to see how it would work out.

We saw him walk in through the gate, and the bloodthirsty hoarding
behind him.

It was quite a day, he continued in the studio. Let’s
just have a look at some of the actors in this drama. One by one,
close-ups of each of us were shown, talking, thinking. Nasrullah
Khan, deputy head, humanitarian extraordinary. Rajinder Singh and
Paca Ortega, Sikh and Filipina, clear-sighted and courageous leaders
of their peers. Jack Marchmont, charismatic and brilliant. His
brother Neal, enchanting and compassionate. Max Margrave and Eloise
Parr, minister and head teacher, staying out of the limelight.

Let me declare an interest. I applied to be a mentor, and I’ve
just been approved. Because of where I live, when I’m finally
assigned a pupil, he or she will very likely be one of these children,
and that hasn’t been something I’ve looked forward to, because Madigan
doesn’t have a good reputation. But today I learnt a lesson about
that, and several other things.

“I like you, Andrew Mason,” said Max.

All the morning, the children were being measured and fitted
with their Standard Clothing and Golden Circles, and I became
increasingly aware of an atmosphere of rising tension.

As as he spoke there were a series of short clips of students
arguing, some in lifesuits and some not, groups confronting each
other, and so on.

There are many groups here, as there are in Birmingham as a
whole, different races, different religions. And there is blood
between them. This is not academic: there are people, many people,
who have lost relatives, parents, brothers and sisters. There is much
hatred, and many people feel the most important things in their lives
are threatened by what’s happening here today.

We saw the children filing into the hall.

Into this comes Jack Marchmont.

The camera kept pace with me walking in my cloak down a corridor
in the school. My face was serious and intent, and the others were
following behind me. I was surprised, because I’d changed: I looked
determined, strong and even a little arrogant. I thought that Fred
and the general would be pleased.

“I need a haircut,” I said.

I admit, Mason continued, that as an old media hand I’ve
been cynical about the Marchmont phenomenon. I’m familiar with the
mechanisms of celebrity; I know how these things are worked, and I
wasn’t impressed. I found it hard to believe that this child was
responsible for the pieces of writing which have appeared over his
name. I felt we were being taken for a ride, probably quite a good
ride and to a good destination, but a ride nonetheless.

It’s not like that when you see it, believe me. Marchmont was
confronted by a thousand resentful and divided children, most of whom
resoundingly booed him when he started. He produced a barnstormer of
a speech, by turns hectoring, angry, compassionate and challenging,
which tore them to pieces and had them on his side. It was a bravura
performance, but what amazed me, checking later, was that it followed
government policy with total orthodoxy.

We saw me speaking, walking back and forth, gesticulating. I
hadn’t realised how much I moved around.

I’m not going to repeat this speech, important though it was,
because it’s the rest of the day I want to look at. But this is the
core of what Marchmont had to say.

As I spoke, we saw not me, but the faces of the children who were
watching. The camera panned along the lines of faces, all different
races, boys and girls, and you could see their distress. Some were
weeping, some had their faces buried in their hands.

I’m looking out in this hall, and there are people from five or
six different religions here, and all of them in their history have
done good and beautiful things. And every single religion has been
involved in the horribleness in this city. Not all their members, but
some. Every single religion. Am I right?

Yes!

Not good enough, people! Can anyone honestly claim that no one
has been killed in the name of their religion? You know it isn’t true!
You know that there are groups in every single one of them which have
blood on their hands. Am I right? Please, people, be honest. I know it
hurts, but am I right?

YES!!

You had to be there, Mason continued, to appreciate the
way that so many of these kids were hurting at this point. What they
had just done was to accept an identity with all the students in other
religions and races who had suffered, and to admit that their own
religions were not faultless. It’s a truly revolutionary moment. And
then Marchmont offers them a way out, a solution.

And now we saw the kid’s faces again, their pain and also the
beginning of hope.

But we can do something about it. We can. What we
need is people who can spot the nastiness and reject it. Who can see
through the confusion and layers and layers of history, and find what
is good in each religion, and build on that. But you can’t do that if
you’re mixed up in the whole thing. You have to take a step back.

And that’s what all this is about. We are all going to step away from
our religions, and from our races, and from everything which divides
us. We’re going to step back from all that until we’re twenty.
We’re going to learn to think, and learn to reject the things that
make us hate.

Notice what Marchmont is saying, said Mason, and it’s
down-the-line government policy. Not: all religions are evil. Not:
abandon your religion. Just: step back for a while, and think, so
that you can find the good that’s there. It’s carefully aimed.

That we sacrifice our freedom, our freedom of religion for one
thing, for that time, so that our country and our communities, and even
our religions can be renewed, built on the fact that we’re all human
beings, not on hatred. ... That’s the marvellous thing about being a
controlled child. I said before, we will be a mighty generation, and
people in the future will gasp in wonder at what we will achieve.

In place of the horror and infamy of the recent past, he holds
up the prospect of glory and honour, said Mason. And it
carries him, finally, into the appeal.

That’s what I’m asking everyone to do, to help me, to help us,
to do this. Please, everyone. I’m begging you. Will you help?

YES!!

And they say yes; of course they do. Marchmont has put them
face-to-face with their pain and confusion, and provided them with a
way out. Of course they take it. And having seen Marchmont speak,
there’s no doubt in my mind that this was indeed his own work, because
it was clearly entirely extempore. When it comes to this boy, and
it’s sometimes hard to remember that that’s what he is, I’m a
convert.

But remarkable as the speech was, what followed was even
wilder, and that was the Joining, as it’s called. It starts quietly
enough. The students are mostly going back to their classes, leaving
behind this remarkable pair: Rajinder Singh and Paca Ortega, clearly
carefully selected by Mr Nasrullah. The Marchmonts take them down
onto the floor, and the quiet, almost private ritual is carried out;
they make their pledge in the words you can see on posters up and down
the land, and then learn the words by heart. It’s in the nature of
this ritual that it happens orally. What else are they saying? I
don’t know. It’s adjusted for each person. This is not a mass event,
but a thousand personal events, and it’s in its nature that we don’t
know. But I spoke to this pair afterwards.

Rajinder: This is the way forwards. It has to be. It’s up to
us, the young people, to decide to make a new country here. It’s up
to us to reject all the hatred and move on. I’m a Sikh, and the basis
of my religion is that all religions are one, and all humanity is one.
Now I won’t be able to wear a turban or the other signs, but I can
live with that, to build a new world, I certainly can.

“Brilliant!” said Max.

Paca: I’ve already moved away from my religion. There are
parts which are good, of course there are, but most of them are shared
with other religions. I think if I can help to move other kids away
from hatred and violence I’ll be doing what human beings are supposed
to do. Doing something difficult to make a difference, that
appeals to me.

After that, said Mason, it was four more, and then it
just snowballed.

And we saw the familiar picture of the hall, full of joining
quartets.

The protocol of the Joining is that adults aren’t involved.
The torch is being passed from controlled child to controlled child,
in this case from the Marchmonts to Paca and Rajinder, who are called
the pyramid-points for this school, and from them into the rest of the
school. But if you look, you can see that each child is being handled
individually. Sometimes Jack or Neal is involved. But increasingly
the other students are going to Rajinder and Paca, and then to the
ones in the next layer, and finally to everyone.

And there are many problems here, many children crying, some
showing anger. Watch Neal Marchmont comforting this girl, who was
being abused daily by her uncle. Here he is again, this time with a
boy who wanted to leave his parents’ extremist church but had been
unable to. Jack, talking to a Muslim girl whose parents wanted to
marry her to a cousin in Pakistan. Rajinder, discussing things with a
fellow Sikh. Paca, talking to two girls who had been raped by members
of their church. I managed to snatch a few words with Neal
Marchmont

Mason: How’s it going, Neal?

Neal: It’s going well. But I’ve never been in a school where
so many people are hurting. A lot of bad things have happened
here.

Mason: It’s surprising that you can persuade people to accept
losing their freedom.

Neal: Really, I don’t think we’re taking any freedom from a lot
of these kids. I don’t think they had any to start with, and really I
think we’re giving them more.

“That’s great, brother,” I said. “Really good.”

Later, after a harrowing discussion with a boy, I saw Neal
grab his brother and Rajinder, and they went into a corner to do the
ritual themselves. Because this little ritual is used by controlled
kids to centre themselves and give each other help. It’s all about
helping each other. This is Sam Carter—I have permission from his
guardian to show him—his guardian being Mr Nasrullah. He has Downs
syndrome, and these two girls, who refused to be named, spent nearly
two hours teaching him the words. And they succeeded. I had a short
chat with Sam afterwards.

Mason: What have you learned today, Sam?

Sam: I am not afraid.

Mason: Aren’t you frightened of being a controlled child?

Sam: No. Cos if I’m that, then I won’t be like the crazy
people and kill people when I grow up. And if all the kids do that,
then everyone will be nice, and everything will be better. And maybe
people will stop shouting “duh!” at me in the street.

“Oh, my darling boy!” said Max.

Mason: So you’re not afraid.

Sam: No. Because I—I am the future!

That just about says it for me. Let me say, after watching
this afternoon: I would be proud and delighted to have any single
child from this school as my pupil. If you’re thinking about being a
mentor—stop thinking, and apply. It might do more good than you
can imagine.

The afternoon finished with everyone reciting it together,
under Jack Marchmont’s direction. But I thought we’d end with Sam’s
performance—to accompany a little vandalism carried out by the
Minister for Children and a few of his friends. And thanks to all at
Madigan High for a much needed slice of optimism.

And we heard Sam’s voice reciting Joining, while we saw
Max, carrying a rope, gather together a group of kids from the hall
and run laughing across the road to the hoarding we had hated. He
threw the rope round it, and they all began to heave. I am not
afraid! said Sam as it crashed to the ground. The kids danced on
it and we all cheered.

“Yes,” said Max. “Also I think he really cares. It was
brilliant. Rajinder and Paca came across well. And Sam was a total
sweetie. And how about Nasrullah? With a Downs foster kid?”

“How about you, pulling down that sign?” said Tony.

“Well, I’d had enough. Bureaucratic shite! What’s the use of
being a military régime if we can’t do what we like? We’ll
have a constitution before you can whistle for breakfast, and then
we’ll have to go back to being respectable. In the meantime, no
racist hoardings are safe from Max and the Madigan Boot Boys!”

“He will break a lesser rule when a greater good compels
him,” said Tony.

“Neal was the one Mason really liked,” I said. “I think he was a
bit suspicious of me.”

“Not suspicious,” said Max. “It was more he was in awe of you, I
think.”

I stared at him in complete astonishment.

“You’ve given me a lot to think about this afternoon, Jack,” he
went on. “A lot. You directed the whole thing, you knew exactly what
to do, and you did it. And I know that’s not all—Tony’s been telling
me about all the other stuff you’ve been doing, dealing with kids and
teachers, and I saw it myself today; you’re scarcely off the phone.
How many schools is it? Twenty? And another twenty-seven your
neighbourhood teams have done, and you’re in touch with all of them,
aren’t you?”

“I guess,” I said.

“You’ve become a leader, Jack. You have a position, and
responsibility and a name. You have your own policies, and you have
followers all over the country. You have power.”

Although I’d never thought in exactly those terms, what he said
wasn’t new to me. But just at that moment it made me feel
uncomfortable and confused.

“Think of it from Mason’s point of view,” said Max. “You’re a
kid, but you turned that school upside down. And he could see
straight away how vital the Joining is, and what you were doing for
those kids, and I’m beginning to see it too.”

“Yes,” said Ewan, “after today and after looking at Susan’s disk,
it’s a clear to me that being a controlled child is a hell of a lot
more difficult than we thought it would be. If you haven’t seen the
disk of the meeting at Chedley High the other day, Max, you really
need to.”

“Definitely. And how about that speech today! It was almost
frightening, in a way. How the hell do you do that, with zero
preparation? It’s uncanny.”

“Remember we talked about it on the ramchopper?” I said. “I mean,
Mason said how wonderful that it was government policy but my mind was
stuffed with it. And something Mr Nasrullah said just before we
started, that these were all kids who had suffered, I mean he’s right
in there, he sees it from the kids’ point of view—not as just a
row of problems but a thousand kids who’ve all been through hell. So
suddenly I thought if I ask them those questions they’ll see that
everyone’s been hurt, and maybe we can take from there. I was
following my nose. One day I’ll get lost and it’ll be a disaster.”

“You know, I’d never heard you make a speech before,” said Ewan.
“When did you start doing that?”

“The first time, that was when Chedley High got their Golden
Circles,” I said. “Tony and Mr Andrews just pushed me out on the
stage and said, hey, look after them. What could I do? I mean, Neal
was out there with them and they were on the point of panicking.”

“I thought you’d just answer a few questions,” said Tony. “You
know, tell them don’t worry, it’s all okay, no problems.”

“Tried it,” I said, “but it didn’t work. There was this bunch of
first-years in front of the stage and they were white with terror.
There were all sorts of rumours in the school, you know? So I
switched to the stuff about how great it is to be a controlled child,
some stuff I’d been thinking myself, and completely wrecked Susan and
Bill’s strategy.”

“You were right though,” said Susan. “Our line was impossible
once the controls were public.”

“What’s the plan for tomorrow?” said Neal.

“Thrampton Road Junior,” said Tony. “There’s 150 kids, nine, ten
and eleven. Start there at nine o’clock, we should be able to finish
and get back to the Centre for a late lunch.”

“He’s my pupil,” Ewan growled fearsomely. “He goes to bed when I
say he goes to bed. And I say now!”

“Oops!” I said. “Night, everyone!”

I ran out of the bar with Ewan in hot pursuit. We stopped at the
desk to get our key.

“Oh yes, sir, we had to change your room,” said the man. “We’ve
moved your luggage. I hope you find the room satisfactory....”

Slightly miffed, we took the key and went up in the lift to a
completely different floor. Greatly daring, I wrapped my arm round
him as we walked along the corridor.

“I missed you,” I said. “I missed you so, so much. I was almost
certain you’d left me for good. I don’t care what you do to me, just
never make me think you’ve left me again. I’d rather—I’d rather you
whipped me than that.”

“I can’t leave you. The Indenture—legally it’s not possible. I
can’t whip you, for that matter. The assault control...”

“Max turned it off when I went to Dan’s.”

“I hate it that you went through that. You must tell me about it
later.”

“Fuck me tonight,” I whispered in his ear, as he fumbled with the
key to our room.

“Not tonight. But I will. When the time is right.”

The door opened. And the room was filled with candles, that was
my first thought: dozens and dozens, along the tables and the
windowsills and the bed head, everywhere. The bed was huge and turned
back ready, and on it was an envelope. As if in a dream I picked it
up, the candles flickering in the draft.

“Shut the door,” I said. “Look. It’s addressed to us.”

He looked over my shoulder as I opened it. It was a card, and it
showed just the Golden Circle, and inside, in Max’s handwriting:
Congratulations and Good Luck. And the signatures: Tom Baxter.
Sally Baxter. Uncle Alan. Auntie Judy. Neal. Mat and Marcus. Max
and Carrie, and all their kids. Dan and Jeff. Tony, Susan, Lakshmi,
Marietta. Bill. Fred and all his men. And beneath those: Nasrullah
Khan, Rajinder Singh, Paca Ortega. And at the bottom of the page: We
love you.

“Wow,” I said. “They cared enough... They cared enough to collect
these signatures from all over, and to put all these candles... They
really cared, didn’t they?”

“Sometimes I won’t ask, and sometimes I will. Just now I’m
asking. May I kiss you?”

“If you don’t soon, I shall scream.”

So he kissed me, and it was like coming home. It was peace at the
heart and the return to happiness. Then he sat on the bed and did it
again, with me standing between his legs.

“Take your clothes off, my pupil,” he whispered.

He did something to his hand, and I felt the silence control come
on, and it almost pushed me over the edge. This time I could open my
mouth, but still I couldn’t make a sound, I couldn’t talk or moan or
laugh. As I slid out of my lifesuit, the silence control was like his
hands on me from a distance, like his hands held softly but firmly
over my mouth, gagging me. The moment I was naked, he picked me up
and lay me on the bed, and his mouth was on me, swallowing me. I felt
his tongue swirl round me, his hands on my balls, and in my enforced
silence it was almost too intense to bear. Then he sat back on his
heels between my legs.

“Tomorrow, Max is going to talk to you about the mentor controls,
all of them,” he said. “Part of the new ‘keep Jack informed’ policy.
But I’ll tell you what one of them is. Doesn’t work yet, but when it
does: I twiddle the wheel, and you can’t come. No matter what you do,
you can’t. For days and days, I stop you. You get hotter and hotter,
more and more frustrated. Maybe it’s a week, maybe two. You beg me
and beg me, I silence you, all you can do is look, look and plead with
your eyes...”

It was too much, too much after a day of hanging on the edge,
frantic to hold him, after a fortnight when I scarcely once managed to
bring myself off, I’d been so depressed. I arched my back, and
silently, without even being touched, I came, bursting again and
again, all over my body and his face.

“Oh yes,” he whispered. “So perfect, so perfect. We are going to
have such times.”

He lay beside me and held me as I recovered myself. Then he took
me into the bathroom, and just as I had dreamed, we showered in the
darkness, with me unable even to speak. I felt his hands on me, all
over me, and I imitated him, moving my soapy hands over his body, over
his face, and then down, and his dick and balls were fully in my hands
for the first time. I marvelled at the feel of them, and moved them
gently, so gently, while my lips found one of his nipples, and I was
working him; but after only a few strokes he screamed and came, and I
felt his juices in the shower spray, falling on my body. He held me
gently, and I thought I was in heaven; and he knelt before me, my
mentor, and once again my dick was in his mouth, and now he was more
assertive, knowing I was less on edge, his hands on my cheeks held me
firmly against him. He was sucking me harder and harder, and I felt
his soapy hands move into my crack. One of them touched my opening,
and it was like lightning striking into my guts. I convulsed in his
arms and came again, as silently as ever, and the containment of my
voice was a perfection, a soft, delicious grip on my soul. I
abandoned myself into his control, and ecstasy consumed me.

I lay on his chest, face down, and he stroked my hair. All around
us the candles guttered and flickered, and the smell, the intimacy of
the light, reminded me of something, something in my early childhood
which I couldn’t remember, some memory of home and love. He stroked
my hair and my back, and it was complete peace and contentment. If I
die tomorrow, I thought, it won’t matter after this moment, because
this is all I want from life.

He had turned the silence control off, and that was right too,
now, because it was also good to talk, to be close enough, to
have time enough, to talk.

“When I first saw you,” he said, “I just thought: nice, a pretty
boy. And he’s—looking, you know? You get to recognise that.
And I liked your uncle, so I came back that evening, and it was nice,
because your uncle and aunt were intelligent open-minded people, and
you and Neal were as bright as buttons, and you were still looking, so
I thought I’d spend some more time with you.”

“You could tell I was looking? How embarrassing! Mind you, Neal
spotted you that first day, he noticed you were looking at
me.”

“Really? He’s so bright. Anyhow, the next day I arranged for
that TV crew to be at your school, because I thought the two of you
would make good pictures. And that’s how it started. And I
discovered that you had a way with words, and a knack of getting
through to people, of making them like you. Also that there was a
strong submissive streak in you, but very confused. I was enchanted.
I fell in love with you hard, and very quickly.”

“It was a wonderful time for me, it was like the world opening up,
after The Problems, suddenly there was this wonderful man who was
interested in me, just for me, because I never really thought much of
myself. And you said such lovely things, that being with me was so
important, and so on. I loved it. I was submitting to you, I could
feel it. But then...”

“I know, I know...”

He gripped me tightly.

“Why did you do that?” I said. “I mean really, why did you?
Because, well, I didn’t say this at the meeting, but it was—it was
horrible. It was like when our parents died, as bad as that. It was
so sudden, one minute we were talking and planning for the future, the
next I was in a kind of black hole...”

“I’ve been with young teenagers before, and I’ve been hurt before.
Somehow I felt that you hadn’t suffered enough to be trusted with my
life. Does that sound cruel? I was going to put you through a bad
spell, to see if you’d stick it out. I felt I already loved you, but
it didn’t seem like you had done a lot to earn that love. Does that
make sense? Looking back, those were cruel things to feel, but
that’s what it was. I thought you could do with some growing up. I
had no idea that you’d suffer the way you did. None of the other
teenagers I was with would have bothered much.”

For a while I didn’t know what to say, I was so shocked by his
words.

“You were in charge. Even before you were my mentor, before you
left me. I made you the master of our relationship, I gave you the
right to do whatever you chose with it. That’s what Dan taught me, he
made me accept whatever you planned for me. I still do, I can’t
withdraw from that. But I had suffered before we even met. I lost my
parents; I heard the burnings in the park, I spent a year terrified
that someone would find out I was gay and have me burnt too. Do you
know what a child sounds like while he’s being burnt alive?”

“Yes,” he whispered. “I know. I’ve heard that sound. You should
never have had to hear it.”

He stroked my back quietly for a while. I said nothing. These
reasons were worse than any of the others he had given, but still in
the back of my mind was the feeling I had had before, that they were
not complete. And now, dimly, I began to perceive what was missing,
and how it would affect what I had become; and that evening I couldn’t
face it.

“But I haven’t finished my story,” he said. “Because when I came
back I discovered how wrong I’d been. Because there’s far more to you
than I thought, layers and depths I never guessed about. But the
others, they found them, didn’t they? Alan, Max and Tom and George,
Dan and Jeff, Tony and Susan, they were the ones who had the joy and
privilege of finding that out. They were the ones who read the
Request first, and heard your speech at Chedley, and they found
out how deep and beautiful your submission runs. They saw Joining
the Future recited for the first time, and the first kids’ faces
light up as you showed them how they could make it. They were there
for it all, and I missed it. That’s my punishment, Jack, and it’s
bitter, oh God! it’s bitter...”

I felt him shake, and to my horror I realised that he was crying.

“There’s one thing,” I said, determined to give him some gift.
“I’m your Pupil, and I’m—I’m your lover. I’m yours, all of me is
yours. You will direct me now, and decide how I develop and
everything that happens. None of them will have that, only you.
You’re the only one I shall ever call my mentor.”

For a long while he was silent.

“Thank you, my Pupil. Thank you, my dear lover.”

I licked his chest.

“You taste of soap... I’ll tell you something. On Monday last
week there was this meeting, me, Max and Tony, Bill and Susan, and we
finalised the shape of Joining the Future and Max laid out the
plan for the schools we’d visit over the last two weeks. Then he told
us they were going to announce the discipline, you know? as the first
mentor control, they were going to announce it that evening. And I
almost lost it. But somehow I kept my cool and argued against it, and
Susan and Bill backed me up. So in the end Max agreed to announce the
silence control first, as it’s much easier to sell. Of course I still
hated it, not for me but for all the other kids, and we had a
ferocious row in the bus going to the first school, the school where
his kids are, in fact.”

“I told them it was daft to do the discipline first. You and
Susan and Bill were entirely right.”

“But the thing is, you know how protective my uncle is? Usually
he’s in there, battling for me. But he didn’t. He said it was a row
between colleagues and none of his business. And he said I was an
important person now, taking executive decisions in high-level
meetings, and if I was being mistreated I had my own remedies, and
basically I should stop wingeing and grow up.”

“What did you say?”

“Nothing. He was right, and I apologised to Max. But the thing
is there’s stuff I need from you. I really need a mentor, Ewan.”

He was silent for a while.

“Look in my bag,” he said, finally. “There’s a folder of papers
for new mentors. Bring it over here.”

I untangled myself reluctantly, and got it for him.

“Sit there,” he said, pointing to a spot on the bed.

I sat and crossed my legs.

He rifled through the papers, but already I knew what he was
looking for. He handed it to me.

“Read it to me, my Pupil. Tell your mentor what you want from
him.”

I looked at him for a moment, and he reached out and caressed my
hair and face. Strangely, I wasn’t hard. Something made me change
the title back to the original.

“My Mentor,” I began.

I read it through carefully. And as I did, a strange thing
happened: the whole atmosphere of the piece changed for me. As I
finished it, I smiled at him, and he held out his arms.

“You smiled.”

“Everyone likes that piece, but I never did,” I said. “To me it
was about loss, that’s all; loss and pain. But this time it was
different.”

“I’m glad,” he said. “Because it’s beautiful. And clever, too.
And wise. There’s a lot there. Did you see George’s interview with
JoAnne Rossi? It’s on Susan’s disk.”

“Yes. Tony showed it to us in Chedley yesterday.”

“It was shocking to start with, for me. That was before I saw
everything that happened in Birmingham, and Mason’s report. I
understand what George meant now, and I can see I have a huge
responsibility, to be Jack Marchmont’s mentor. Can you accept now how
significant you’ve become?”

“I’m beginning to see that I have a lot of responsibilities,” I
said.

“C’mon,” he said. “Go through the Request and tell me who
uses bits of it as mottoes.”

I blushed.

“That was an order, my Pupil,” he said, smiling.

“Okay. This is my hope—that’s George Padmore’s Ministry.
He will tend me and care for me and help me grow and
unfold—that’s the Ministry for Children. Kindly and firmly he
will guide and control me, and take me forwards step by
step—that’s the Provisional Administration itself. He will
stand beside me against everything that threatens me—that’s the
Ministry for Security. And Stand Beside is what Fred’s team call
their operation.”

“So does Dan,” I said. “He wants to fuck me, he said. He said he
would approach my mentor...”

“What? The cheek of it! Mind you... Hmmmm... Not for a year or
two, I think. Proceed, my Pupil.”

“I will be his comrade as well as his pupil, and our
partnership will astonish the world—the Chief Executive. On
the world he will build his understanding—the Ministry of Science
and Technology. He will be gentle with the weak and the oppressed,
and fierce with the cruel and violent—Chedley TerrAd. He will
judge people not by what they are, nor by what they say, but by what
they do—the Ministry of Justice. He will speak the truth. He
will keep his promises—the Ministry of Public Education. All
these things he will share with me—Chedley High School.”

“So by my count that’s six ministries have mottoes from the
Request; as do the Administration as a whole, and the Chief
Executive. Am I right?”

“Yeah, I guess.”

“Okay, I want you to say the following: The Request has
been hugely influential on the government.”

“Ewan, I can’t...”

“Look at me, my Pupil. Now listen. You are a controlled child.
I don’t have all the controls as yet. However, I still expect you to
obey my orders. So say that sentence right now, or it’ll be no
orgasms for a week.”

I said it. He made me say it as if I meant it, looking him
straight in the eyes. Ten times over. I was already naked, but after
this I felt stripped to the bone, humiliated beyond belief and
flattered beyond bearing. I was also once again on the very point of
coming.

He made me lie on my back. He turned the silence control on. Then
his mouth was on me.

It took no more than fifteen seconds to bring me to another
silent, writhing orgasm, one so strong this time that I almost lost
consciousness.

I lay face down against him, my body satiated and exhausted, as he
stroked my head and back and murmured unceasing endearments. That
evening he had conveyed to me with complete clarity that my life had
crossed over into a new and very different region. It was only the
latest twist in a tornado of change which had swept over my life in
those few weeks, and over my family, over the whole country: the
tornado of revolution. By the work I had done and the words I had
written, by my indenture, by his mentorship, I had become engulfed in
that tornado, it had subsumed me in every way, mentally, spiritually,
politically, sexually, and it would become both my friend and my enemy
in all of these realms.

It should have terrified me, on that night in Sheffield, with the
candles burning all round us, but it did not. I accepted my role, I
truly joined my future, however it turned out to be.

And even as I lay there, watching the light flicker on the skin of
his chest, I knew that there was something left unsaid, something
between us we had not faced, something that lay against my heart like
a thin shard of glass. That evening I chose to pass it by. No matter
what happens, I thought, we shall have this evening, this evening
among the candles; and I smiled. My voice still silenced, I let
myself sink into the merciless tenderness of my mentor’s love.

This is the end of The Golden Circle, the
first part of the sequence A Time of Change.
If you’ve read this far, thanks; a special thanks to all who have
written to me. I’m working on a sequel, which will appear here—but
not until I’ve finished it, which could be a while. Until then,
goodbye.
Nial 19 April 2004